If you are looking for a great family type resort, Vorlage will welcome you with great ski and snowboard conditions and friendly service. Night skiing is available 6 nights per week on 12 of the runs and they run lots of different programs with different age groups, so its a great opportunity to socialize and ski at the same time. Conveniently located close to Ottawa/Hull in a beautifull little village called Wakefield, with all of the amenities such as boutique and rental shop, cafeteria and bar, ski and snowboard school and a terrain park, Vorlage can meet all of your needs. Not the most challenging though – out of 16 trails, most are intermediate level, with this hill offering only 3 difficult runs and only 1 expert. They`ve recently introduced a new intermediate run called Arcade, that was a welcome addition. They`ve also recently invested in newer snow making guns, to help a little where Mother Nature might be lacking.

2 responses to “Ski Vorlage”

I used to teach at Vorlage, but it’s been a couple of years since I’ve been back to my ‘home hill’.

The place has always been a family hill, and still is, but the old problems are still there. Investments are few and far between but a couple of improvements have been made since my last visit. The old T-bar between Lookout and Birch has been removed, it ran on diesel and sometimes wouldn’t even start, and a new run, Arcade, has been groomed where the T used to be. As well you can now ski across under the green chair near the bottom which is a welcome addition.

I went last night… knowing that my son and I would basically have the place to ourselves, I was right, despite the 2 for 1 Monday night deal I would guess there were perhaps 25-30 people on the entire hill. The snow wasn’t horrible, a little hard, but then we haven’t had a ton of natural snow and it did rain in the last week.

Good to see some new tower snow guns running but as usual here we are on the second to last day of January and Vorlage still hasn’t opened some core trails. (I like how in the description above it says “newer” snow guns… as with most things “new” at Vorlage they are likely cast-offs from another hill, as were the “new” chairs installed on the blue lift a few years back.) This has been typical over the last several years… and I’m sure season’s pass holders are fed up with it. It seems to me that whoever is managing the place is a major procrastinator. They claim 100% snowmaking so why, this far into the season, is the snow park little more than a rough pile of man-made snow and a stack of boxes and rails at the bottom of the run? Why is there not one single ‘expert’ run open yet? Carnaval was well covered (with a good base and about 4″ of powder… which having ducked under the CLOSED tape for our last 3 runs I can say was in fine shape) but not open, it’s a key run and should be one of the first to open. Perhaps the snow-cat(s) are in for repair or had spewed hydraulic fluid all over the place again… or maybe there’s just no diesel in the tank.

The hill is basically staffed by local teens, especially at night. The average age of the 6-8 lift attendants was well under 20, and the guys at the blue chair were taking turns driving ski-doos like complete a$$holes and tearing around blind corners near the bottom of the lift with zero respect for safety or clients. None of them wearing helmets… I’ve never understood this… how does the place get insurance? Why is the CSST not dropping by unannounced and doing inspections? It wouldn’t surprise me in the least to hear of a nasty accident at some point.

Anyway, for the most part, if you want to avoid crowds then this is the place to go, although weekends can get pretty crazy and given that the three (only two if you are anything other than a beginner) chairs are old school, and I mean OLD school doubles your ride down will be MUCH faster than your ride up! Although it’s less than 10 minutes further than Camp Fortune it doesn’t suffer from the same influx of unsupervised and disrespectful teens dropped off by their parents for the day or evening, so you can walk through the cafeteria without wading through scattered bags, shoes, and clothing or slipping on the results of a food fight.

Sad really… the place has potential, but the owner is more concerned about wrapping things up early so he can go to Florida. Oh and there’s NOT 5 lifts… four if you include the remaining T-bar that rarely runs, and for most people… call it two chairs as you could walk up hill backwards faster than the orange chair! Anyway if you’ve got young kids or are on a budget then this place does fill a need, worth a look if you know what to expect.